Inscribed in ink along right margin: Offset lithography BUT: The experiment went like this: I silkscreen black ink over an acetate sheet (clear). Then, over a light table I scratched this head of Don Pablo thus making a negative. When exposed over a sensitized offset zinc plate the positive was created. Therefore it is really an original print being that the transfer was not photographic. I drew with only my own pencil sketch for a model which was done mostly from memory. Casals as yet had not arrived in P.R. No photos available only a small program from Prades. Front view about the size of a dime

{This is listed as being related to an anniversary; I'm not sure what, specifically, it is meant to commemorate but see: 'On Max Wertheimer and Pablo Picasso: Gestalt Theory, Cubism and Camouflage' by RR Behrens, 1998.}

Lorenzo Homar (1913-2004) was born in Puerto Rico but moved to New York City with his family when he was fifteen. Financial pressures forced him to leave school early for a textile factory job and he obtained some tutoring for his emerging interest in art. He moonlighted as a vaudeville gymnast.

Homar found a position with Cartier Jewellers in 1936 as an apprentice designer, where his on-the-job training in drawing and engraving was augmented with night classes in typography, painting and graphic design at the Pratt Institute.

In the Second World War Homar enlisted and served in the Pacific in New Guinea and he was awarded a Purple Heart following injuries received in action in the Philippines. His draughtsman skills were put to good use in mapmaking for the Army Intelligence Unit and his military sketches were published in a number of journals in the United States.

After the war, Homar returned to Cartier, took more art classes in Brooklyn and continued his habitual tumbling and acrobatic practice on the beach at Coney Island. There are more than a few prints devoted to athletic pursuits among his portfolio.

He returned to Puerto Rico in 1950 where he co-founded the Puerto Rican Arts Centre with a group of fellow artists. A governmental Directorship of Community Arts Education followed and he also established a graphic arts workshop. Homar excelled at screenprinting in particular and he established his own studio in 1975.

"Homar is credited as the artist most responsible for promoting printmaking in Puerto Rico. He trained other important artists, such as Antonio Martorell, José Rosa and Myrna Báez, and ran workshops at Cali in Colombia and in Havana, Cuba, helping to extend his influence further afield in Latin America. While serving as director of the graphic workshop of the Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, the most important in Puerto Rico, from 1957 to 1970, he produced more than 500 posters and several portfolios of screenprints, such as Casals Portfolio (1970), which were admired for their distinctive style and sophisticated technique. As many as 30 to 40 manual runs were used in the making of each poster, which were characterized also by an expressive use of typography and textures.

Screenprinted posters, woodcuts, engravings, political cartoons, book illustrations, logos and stage designs all feature in Homar’s prolific production. From 1964 to 1972 he produced a series of monumental woodcuts in which he combined political or poetic texts with highly evocative images and expressive rhythmic incisions. Assimilating aspects of American Realism and German Expressionism, he also continued producing paintings on social realist themes rendered in a neat, meticulous style that suggests a printmaker’s rigour and precision." [Mari Carmen Ramírez from Grove Art Online {via Zen Studio}]

(just to explain...) I sent Derrick a link to the Homar collection before I made this post because I saw some similarities to Erik Nitchse, the graphic designer whose works Derrick has been scanning and uploading over the last year or so.

does anyone know of a commemorative brass coin about the size of a u.s. dollar coin. It has a slave on it with broken chains and states:certenario de la abolicion de la esclavitus en puerto rico below the figure with the broken chains is the years 1873-1973

And yes, to clarify any doubt on whether the figure between Kennedy and Casals is Muñoz Marín, it is. When he was governor, he hosted Pres. Kennedy and Jackie on an official visit to PR and had Casals play for them in a private reception at La Fortaleza, the Governor's mansion.